Something flashed in the Joker's metallic blue eyes, "Jealous? Ha!" Gathering a fistfull of knotted blonde hair, he yanked her head back until her neck was bent so horribly she could barely breathe. "Why would the King of Crime be jealous that some second-rate criminal fucked his two-bit whore?"

Harley, momentarily taken aback, soon let her anger overwhelm her. "Well, if I'm such a fucking whore, ya shoulda left me in that fucking cell to rot!"

"Since when do ya think your callin' the shots around here, blondie?" He tossed her forward, enjoying the way she sprawled on her hands and knees before him. She looked like she was bowing. "I busted ya out of that cell because... because... fuck!"

"I thought ya were dead, Puddin'. For months, I fantasized about what woulda happened if ya hadn't pushed me out the back of that helicopter. Floyd... he was there for me when ya weren't... he actually cared about how I felt -," the sound of a gun firing made her jump, effectively silencing her.

The Joker, still holding the smoking pistol, was practically shaking. "Don't ya fuckin' say his name again, ya here me? Never. Again."

Against her better judgement, Harley began to giggle. "Ya are jealous, Mistah J -,"

The gun fired again, distoring the smiley-face of bullet holes just above their bed. "I am not jealous!"

Even if he couldn't bring himself to say it, Harley knew that he'd rescued her from Belle Reve because he loved her. Most likely, he'd been plotting her rescue since the moment he climbed out of the smoldering ruins of the helicopter. She knew that he, on some level, blamed himself for her original capture - after all, he was the one that had so brilliantly driven off the side of the road into Gotham Harbor after she'd warned him that she couldn't swim...

So for him, the news of her betrayal had to be absolutely devastating, especially considering that he'd devoted the last six months of his life to a goal that didn't involve Batman (and the fact that she had rated above the Bat for any amount of time was actually pretty astounding). But she'd spent the last six months contemplating the likelihood of divine intervention... or using somewhat less miraculous means of reuniting with her Puddin'.

"I'm gonna kill him." The Joker whispered, his voice eerily dark. "No, no... where would the fun be in that? No... I'll lure him to the funhouse... have a coupla henchmen rough him up a bit... and then get myself a front row seat to the main attraction: you, my dear, putting a bullet between the bastard's eyes."

Harley visibly deflated, "B-But he saved my life, Puddin'. If it weren't for him, we wouldn't be together -,"

"Who said I was interested in reclaiming damaged merchandise?" He barked, twirling the gun between his fingers for a few seconds, before leaning forward and dragging the cool metal barrel against her pale white flesh. "And isn't that what you are, now? Daddy's favorite toy is broken beyond repair. What a shame."

"B-But I'm not broken, Puddin'. Your Harley just got an upgrade - she's better and badder than ever before." Harley tried to smile, but it was shaky and didn't reach her eyes.

"Did ya like it?" When the barrel of the gun was level with her pulse point, the Joker met her eyes and grinned maniacally.

Suddenly very much afraid, Harley squeaked out a weak, "Did I like what, Mistah J?"

His grin faltered, "Did ya like bendin' over and spreadin' your legs for him like a fucking harlot? Tell me, did he have ya scream his name? Did he screw ya so hard, ya couldn't walk for three days? I bet ya loved it - loved getting treated like the little slut that you -,"

The resounding slap echoed through the bedroom - Harley hadn't even realized that she'd stood up, crossed the distance between them, and struck him until the sharp pain flared up in her hand. The Joker's eyes were blown wide with surprise, and that surprise soon morphed into anger. How dare she? This woman, who had sworn to never hurt him, had just backhanded him because she had had an affair.

But that look of angry frustration on the Joker's face was matched with one of angry exasperation on Harley's. It was like the slap that she'd dealt him had been the key to opening the floodgate of emotions that she repressed every time the Joker abused her. And she hit him again. This time it was a knee to the stomach, with enough force behind it to send the bigger man crumpling to the ground. And then she hit him again.

She only stopped when the Joker spit out a mouthful of blood, her eyes widening and her hands trembling as she took in what she'd done. She'd just abused her boyfriend. She'd hurt the Joker - in more ways than one. Spitting out another mouthful of blood, the Joker's red-painted lips pulled back into a grin and he began to laugh. Muscular arms wrapped loosely around his torso, afraid to press too tightly and aggravate possibly broken (at least bruised) ribs.

"I'm n-not a slut, M-Mistah J." Only then did she realize that there were tears streaking down her cheeks, the true severity of the situation sinking in.

The Joker was laughing so hard he could barely breathe. It took him several seconds to get his act together, before he whispered, "If ya think ya can just stand there and hit me and I ain't gonna get ya back, girlie, ya have another thing coming."

She swallowed hard, "I think it would be best if we spent some time apart, for now." She backed up slowly, never taking her eyes off the mass laughing hysterically on the ground.

"I'll fucking kill ya, bitch!" And then he broke down into peals of laughter again, not even bothering to stop when the door to the bedroom slammed closed.

A week later, Harley is sitting in a cafe across from Floyd. She's wearing her hair down for once, with a simple black headband holding it back from her face. An expensive pair of black sunglasses rest on the bridge of her tiny nose, the only disguise that she's bothered to acquire since leaving the Joker. She's been nursing the same mug of herbal tea for the last forty-five minutes, and is no closer to talking than she'd been when Floyd had first shown up.

Finally, after several more minutes of near-uncomfortable silence, she asked, "Do ya regret it... what we did, that night?"

Floyd looked confused for a moment, before realization finally sunk in. "No, not really. I mean, it was what you needed - what we both needed - in that moment. We sought comfort in one another in a moment of desperation and fear. There's nothing wrong with that."

"I betrayed my Mistah J..." she took a sip of tea, desperate to hide the way her hands were shaking at the mention of her lover.

"You told him about what happened?" Floyd looked like he'd been struck, before he schooled his features into an unreadable mask. "It wasn't your fault. Don't let him bully you into thinking otherwise, hotness. You thought he was dead - and had good reason to. It wasn't like you tried to cheat on him."

Harley scowled, "He wanted ta know if I enjoyed it."

"Did you?" Floyd asked, just a note of teasing in his tone.

The dark, and rather unexpected blush that rapidly spread over the blonde's cheeks caught the gunman by surprise... and also answered his question. "That doesn't matter."

Floyd shook his head, "Oh, but I think it does. See, the J-man isn't really upset that you cheated. For a man like the Joker, who could have sex with anyone that he wanted," here, Harley's gaze darkened, her shoulders tensing at the very idea of it, "what bothers him is the idea that there is another man who could satisfy you."

Harley paused - Floyd's explanation did make sense, in a weird sort of way. The Joker had practically created her, had molded her from the nothing she'd once been into the perfection he'd seen lying just beneath the surface. Her Mistah J had always satisfied her - whether it be sexually or otherwise, there was never a need left unattended. The idea that, in his absence, another man had filled that void... it would have to be absolutely devastating.

She took another sip of her tea. She'd known the Joker for how many years, and only now was she just breaking into the shell that enclosed the Clown Prince's heart. And she'd had to betray him to do it. Only now, when she had taken that step back and allowed herself a chance to really think about what had happened a week before, she realized that his violent reaction wasn't his way of saying he was jealous. No, her Mistah J was heartbroken.

"He hasn't tried to contact me in a week. He just... just let me walk out the door." Harley sniffed, a stray tear coursing down her cheek. "That ain't like him."

"Hotness," Floyd sighed, sounding very much as if he were forced to explain the obvious to a two-year-old, "Your boyfriend just found out that his girl was sleeping around while he was busy coming up with an elaborate plot to bust her outta jail. That's gonna sting just a little bit."

It was the same old, circular argument that was bound to go nowhere fast. She'd slept with Floyd because she'd had good reason to believe that the Joker was dead, and the Joker, who was apparently very much alive, was furious because she'd slept with Floyd. "So it's a neverending cycle..."

"Just give him some time." But to Harley, that sounded like accepting defeat.

"Ya obviously don't know my Mistah J."

Usually, when she and the Joker would fight, it would only be resolved by her crawling back to him a week or so later. It was incredibly rare for the Joker to extend the olive branch - in fact, the only time she could remember it happening was when he'd come to break her out of Belle Reve. If she just sat back and 'gave him some time', she had a feeling things would never return to normal.

With a soft sigh, she finished the tea and fished a couple of dollars out of her pocket to pay for it. "I should really get goin'...

"Take care of yourself, hotness." Floyd said, rising to his feet as well. "We'll have to get again together soon."

"Yeah," Harley nodded curtly, "soon."

"Oh, thank God." Rocco's reaction to Harley's return was not necessarily encouraging. The rather fresh-looking black eye and ugly blue sling cradling his left arm were enough to make her reconsider her sudden return.

"Where's the bossman?" Swallowing down her fear, she cut right to the chase. This issue with her Puddin' needed to be resolved sooner rather than later.

The henchman laughed uncomfortably, before wincing when that jarred his injured shoulder. "The bossman's hurt. Real bad. Found himself on the wrong end of a switch, and the crazy bastard cut a smile onto the boss' face. They had ta wire his jaw so he wouldn't pull the stitches."

Harley was positively fuming, "And who the hell dropped the ball and let my Puddin' get ganked?"

"The bossman said he could handle this one on his own." He inclined his head toward a smear of blood on the wall, "We learned pretty quick not ta question his judgement."

"Then what the hell happened ta you?" But Harley was pretty sure she knew already.

"Who d'ya think got the lucky job a holdin' the SOB down while the doc wired his jaw?" Rocco bit back.

Harley sighed. Mistah J knew how she felt about him taking solo missions - they were an unnecessary liability. It was like he was just asking to get hurt. She knew without a shadow of a doubt that her Puddin' could handle himself, that wasn't the problem. It was just that he only took on these solo missions after they'd had a fight and he was, even if he'd never admit it (or even realized it himself), emotionally compromised.

Leaving Rocco to nurse his wounds in solitude, Harley sought out her man. It wasn't particularly difficult to find him. As she'd expected, the Clown Prince was seated in the middle of their bed, body propped up against a handsome array of purple and green satin pillows. He was watching something on his phone, his metallic blue eyes narrowed upon the illuminated screen. If Harley didn't know better, she'd suspect he hadn't noticed her at all.

Clearly, he was waiting for her to make the first move, so she bought herself some time by examining the wounds on his face. She might not have been that kind of doctor, but she could tell that the wounds would leave nasty scars. The long, fingernail-like scratches spanning the length of his cheeks, some deep enough to tease blood to the surface, certainly weren't helping things either.

"I didn't enjoy it." Finally deciding to break the silence, she knew that her words had immediately captured his attention. Slowly, blue eyes drifted from the screen in hand to her face - she took that as a positive sign. "At least, not in the way ya might think, Puddin'."

Long, spider-thin fingers reached out, pulling a handsome pistol out from where it had been concealed beneath the blankets. With a simple flick of the wrist, the barrel was trained on her. She swallowed hard as he slowly, methodically popped the safety - Deadshot might've been the greatest marksman in the world, but her Puddin' wasn't half-bad either. And his final threat, issued just a weak before, was clearly not an empty promise.

His finger rested heavily on the trigger, and he cocked his head to the side as if to warn her to weigh her words carefully.

"I've made decisions that I regret, Mistah J. And I regret that having sex with Deadshot hurt you. But I don't regret seeking out comfort when I needed it." He hadn't shot her yet, which was mildly encouraging. "Ya don't know how many nights I spent wishing I'd died with ya in that plane... how many times I tried ta... ta...

"Ya were... no, ya are my everything, Mistah J. And I had ta watch ya die in front of me. And I'll never forgive that psycho bitch for the hell she put me through, but you... ya coulda given me a sign... something, anything ta let me know ya were alive.

Harley swallowed hard, "But there are some lines that just shouldn't get crossed, ya know? Like our little games at the club are only fun 'cause they stop before those pussies cross that line. None of those sorry bastards were you, and neither was Deadshot. He was just a cheap replacement that could never compare ta the real thing.

Kneeling down at the foot of the bed, she leaned forward till the barrel of the gun kissed her between the eyes. "I'm sorry, Puddin'. I'm just... so sorry."

There was a moment of tense silence, before Harley dared to raise her eyes and meet the Joker's. For the first time since she could remember, his walls were way, way down and his eyes reflected a deep-rooted pain that was both surprising and striking. Her breath caught in her throat, and she opened her mouth to apologize again - she would apologize a million and one times if it meant erasing that aweful look of vulnerability from his face - when he pulled the trigger.

She flinched as the gun popped... but there was no pain. Hesitantly, she opened her eyes, afraid that they were playing some twisted version of Russion Roulette, when she saw the gag banner sticking out of the barrel - the word BANG! written in bright purple letters. It was a gag gun. Looking up, she saw the Joker attempting to laugh, his metallic blue eyes reflecting a new kind of pain as the action pulled on his jaw.

And just like that, she knew that everything was going to be alright.